A pro-bono international study on tobacco advertising arrived at two conclusions regarding health warnings about smoking:
1. Pictorial health warning messages are more effective than text messages only, and this is a culturally independent finding. In general, warning with pictures reached higher declarative scores and at the same time the certainty of those opinions is elevated. Moreover, even if textual warnings were evaluated equally high in declarations as pictorial warnings, on emotional level warnings containing pictures are still more convincing therefore attitudes toward them are more certain, as revealed by neuro Reaction Time measure.
2. Communication oriented toward harm done to self and others is more effective than warnings focused only on smokers’ health. Again, this outcome is strong and culturally independent.
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